How does a reviewer write about a novel that centers on a particularly awful incident without ruining the reader’s discovery of how it affects the main character?  Not an easy task but I will try to discuss the novel without revealing this central fact. Adult Ari Silverman is a tenured medieval studies professor at a…

Much has been written about the special friendship between Abraham Lincoln and Joshua Speed. Louis Bayard’s novel is a fictional take, told from the views of Mary Todd and Speed. Since Lincoln and Speed almost always spoke to each other using surnames, I will do the same. Mary Todd relocated to Springfield, Illinois to live…

Set in Iowa City, home to the University of Iowa, Paul is a queer theory student and works as a bartender. Though described as “quiet and white…like the whole state,” there is a sizable quotient of liberal, progressive students, released from their previous mundane environments and thrust into a whirlwind of new experiences. Paul’s experiences…